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Category Archives: cocktails

Absinthe. That’s the stuff that makes people crazy, right? Didn’t the French Impressionist painters guzzle it by the gallon and have wild visions?

These are the kinds of questions that challenge anybody who wants to market Europe’s most misunderstood alcoholic creation.

Absinthe is a green liqueur, about 70 percent alcohol, made from fennel, anise and the bitter leaves of Artemisia absinthium, also known as wormwood.

After it quickly rose to popularity in mid-19th-century Paris, absinthe became demonized and finally outlawed based on the theory that it caused “absinthism.” Drinking it to excess led not only to alcoholism, but epilepsy, dementia and rapid death, the critics of absinthe warned.

But that heavy legacy hasn’t stopped Ted Breaux. Sometimes called “the father of modern absinthe,” Breaux broke the ban to make the category legal in the U.S. after 95 years.

I had a chance to talk to Breaux and sample his pricey product recently. I was prepared to be underwhelmed. Instead, I got hooked. (No, I didn’t start hallucinating.)

Raised in New Orleans, Breaux remembers absinthe as a lurking ghost throughout his youth. “I’d seen the famous Old Absinthe House down on Bourbon Street, which closed long ago. But other than that I never thought much about it.”

Ted started out as an environmental chemist. A gift of rare old absinthe piqued his interest in the legend that it makes those who drink it insane.

“In 1996 I came across not one but two bottles of vintage absinthe, and I drew samples from those and analyzed them. They were pre-ban. I was one of the few people alive that knew what real absinthe used to taste like.”

His tests were a revelation. “I was looking for something harmful, something that would explain the rumors about its bad effects. There was nothing wrong with it. You could put them on the shelf today and sell them. So that was the beginning of a whole paradigm shift in the understanding of absinthe. It had no narcotic quality.”

Thus Breaux began his absinthe-making odyssey. He determined to recreate the spirit, and he successfully took on the U.S. government to overturn our country’s ban on absinthe.

Under the label Jade Liqueurs, Breaux makes five distinctly flavored absinthes in a French distillery that was built by Gustave Eiffel; in the U.S. they range from $60-100 for a 750-ml bottle. No Corpse Reviver is complete without a touch of the stuff. It’s available at bestabsinthe.com. It’s also stocked at several O.C. bars, including La Cave, 25 Degrees, Marine Room Tavern, Tommy Bahama’s, The Cannery, Chapter One, the Ranch and Bayside Restaurant.

Breaux jokes that his absinthe should come with an owner’s manual. “There was a whole rush of people that came out and bought it when it first appeared in 2007. We expected that. We knew that following that, our plan was consumer education. We’ve been doing that for eight years. And it’s helped.”

Breaux stumbled onto a lucky circumstance early in his research.

“The original absinthe plant was never mothballed. They still produced chartreuse and things like that in it. It was relatively unchanged; it still had all the same equipment that made absinthe back in the 1880s.” Breaux was able to set up operations in the plant, located in the town of Saumur in the Loire Valley.

The first year, Breaux anticipated a rush of orders, so he produced 50,000 cases. “We worked all day, six days a week,” he said. The absinthe craze, though blunted a bit by the recession, has come roaring back. Breaux is the first to admit his timing was very lucky.

“We’re in the middle of a huge cocktail renaissance right now. It’s a global phenomenon.”

Strong, spicy and anise-flavored, absinthe has to be respected. Even its licorice-filled nose is enough to bowl over the faint of heart. Many bartenders use it as a wash only; that’s enough to impart its powerful flavor to a cocktail.

Jeez, it’s almost mid-December — time to thinking about doing some Christmas shopping. Here are a few gift suggestions for the wine, beer or spirits lover in your family. I tried to include every price range and find something for everyone, from the casual fan to the dedicated geek.

Babcock Pinot Noir

Walt Babcock started growing grapes in the Santa Rita hills back in the 1970s, when it was a lonely place for winemakers. Now the place is a respected pinot producer, and the Seal Beach restaurateur and his son Bryan are producing world-class pinot noirs and other decent wine for reasonable prices. “Pinot grapes from this area, especially the western side (of the valley), produce wine that’s very dark, very extracted; the yields are small,” Bryan Babcock says. “You get dark, boysenberry, underbrush-y qualities, with notes of juniper, thyme, rosemary and lavender.”

The Bruery’s Preservation Society is a club for fans of the nationally known Placentia craft brewer. Every three months, members receive a package of three different limited-release beers: a strong barrel-aged brew aged in bourbon or other spirit barrels, a sour ale aged in wine barrels, and a limited-release beer, likely from The Bruery’s Preservation Series of experimental beers.

Tired of watching your loved one opening the closet door and catching the wine bottles as they fall? Why not get them a state-of-the-art wine cooler? At a shade under $400, the EdgeStar 34-Bottle Dual Zone Wine Cooler gets the Wine Cooler Review’s top honors. Its compressor-based cooling unit will do the job even in regions with a higher ambient temperature, cooling your wines to as low as 41 degrees Fahrenheit – better than many more expensive models.

Here’s an inexpensive way to taste the potential of the craft-spirits trend. L.A.’s small Greenbar Craft Distillery makes a line of vodkas called Tru, and it comes in four flavors – plain, lemon, organic garden and vanilla – that exemplify the craft movement’s embrace of natural ingredients. One batch of Greenbar’s lemon-flavored vodka uses the zest of 2,000 lemons. Its vanilla vodka soaks up flavor from 5,000 vanilla bean pods. The distillery’s Tru Organic Garden vodka is infused with a savory combination of celery, dill, fennel, coriander, mint, pink peppercorn and other aromatic herbs and spices, then rounded out with vanilla.

From the folks who brought you the Vinturi wine aerator, here’s a similar gizmo that’s made for spirits. You doubt that spirits need aerating the way some wines do? In several blind tests it definitely improved the complexity and depth of expensive small-batch bourbons, peated and unpeated whiskey and some high-end single malt Scotches. It’s marked for accurate bartender’s pours and comes with a pour switch so you can measure, then aerate.

Don’t you hate it when the ice in your spirits melts to the point where it dilutes the taste? Whiskey rocks solve the problem ingeniously. Made of soapstone, they’re square, a bit beveled at the edges, and about the size of a small ice cube. Keep them in your freezer and plunk them into your favorite whiskey glass when ready. A little swish, a two- or three-minute wait, and voila! Your drink is slightly chilled – just enough to take the edge off, but not enough to make the flavors disappear, the way too much ice can do. And the temperature stays fairly constant for 15 minutes or more.

Eric Tecosky remembers what it was like in the Dark Ages of bartending. The improvising. The frustration. The questionable hygienic practices.

It all came to a head whenever he was called upon to make a dirty martini – a martini that was turned salty and a bit murky with the addition of some brine from olive jars.

“Dirty martinis were never my favorite drink to make,” Tecosky said. “We’d take the olives out of the jar, put them in a tray and dump some brine on them. When someone ordered a dirty martini we’d put our hands over the tray to act as a strainer and pour a little bit into the martini glass.” Yuck!

Things improved a bit when Tecosky got into the habit of putting the brine into a squeeze bottle instead.

But one night in the middle of a busy shift at his bar, Tecosky got into a real pickle.

“The squeeze bottle was empty. The olive tray was empty. There was a jar full of olives and no brine. I had to get another jar. It’s hard to open jars when your hands are all wet and you’re multitasking. It took me 10 or 12 minutes to make a drink that should have taken 45 seconds.”

Afterwards, the proverbial light bulb flashed above Tecosky’s head.

“I thought, ‘Why has nobody bottled olive juice?’ That started it all.”

A short period of research led Tecosky to the conclusion that the product didn’t exist. He set out to be the first.

But getting a bunch of olive brine isn’t as easy as you might think.

“Every time I called an olive farm, they said no. Turns out nobody grew enough olives to supply me with the juice. I also found out that there really aren’t that many giant olive farms in the U.S.”

Tecosky came close to giving up. “I didn’t want to import any olive brine from Spain,” he recalled.

Finally, he struck gold. Well, brine. “Literally the very last call I made was to a farm in California. It turns out they were also the largest olive importer on the West Coast.” They had brine to spare.

Tecosky spent several months at the facility (he won’t divulge its name or location, fearing imitators). Finally, after playing with endless variations, he got a mixture he liked.

“I didn’t want to change the basic formula too much; I just wanted to maximize that salty olive goodness,” he said.

By using high-quality olives and drawing the brine directly from the large barrels where they’re placed before being jarred, Tecosky got the taste he wanted. “You get more of an olive front and a salty finish, rather than really salty with a bit of olive at the end.”

The product took off like wildfire when it was introduced in 2005. “Literally the first piece of press that I got, within days I started getting e-mails,” Tecosky recalled. “People would say, ‘I have five jars of olives in my fridge with no brine in them. Do you sell this stuff retail? I’m desperate!’”

Dirty Sue Premium Olive Juicecosts $5.99 at Total Wine & More for a 375 ml. jar. Tecosky recommends using at least half an ounce of it in a martini. “That’s the least amount you can use to give it the right flavor.”

Tecosky is branching out into other garnishes. “I’ve just launched a line of hand-stuffed olives and jalapeno-stuffed onions.” But his next big project is another maligned cocktail, the Bloody Mary.

“Finding the right formula for that will be a real challenge. It’s a saturated market already. There are a lot of decent Bloody Mary mixes out there. But, in my opinion, there isn’t a great one yet.” He laughed. “That’s where I come in.”

The bar and restaurant scene in downtown Huntington Beach is about to get classier. I hope.

Actually, there’s no way of telling yet. But Pacific City is opening next week — that gigondo development just south of the HB pier — and, when it’s finally full sometime early next year, there will be more than a dozen places with ABC licenses. (That’s not counting the adjacent new hotel.)

Rumor has it they’ll be selling local craft beer in the food court, Lot 579, when it launches in February.

Some of the restos and bars coming in will undoubtedly be classy. I’m looking forward to a seafooder called Ways & Means (it was one of my favorite haunts in downtown Orange during its brief life there).

During a hard-hat tour I took last week, I checked out the two most eye-popping spots in the new mall: a couple of top-level spaces with spectacular views of the pier and ocean. I’m told they will be occupied by high-end restaurant-bars.

Say what you will about Pacific City (and I’m not totally thrilled myself with its odd architecture and its potentially disruptive influence on downtown traffic), it’s a welcome addition to the dreary H.B. bar scene.

While it’s been slowly improving over the last couple of years (I love the bar at Hyatt’s Watertable and Dann Bean’s wonderful Main Street Wine Company), downtown H.B. still has way, way too many low-end watering holes for rowdy millennials. Pacific City will give those who are serious about wine, beer and cocktails some viable alternatives — I hope.

Next week, intern Bo McMillan and I weigh in on the cover of the Food section with an appraisal of flavored vodka. After years of over-the-top confectionery flavors, the trend is finally returning to reality with infusions that are more natural and make sense as a cocktail ingredient.

I talked recently to Carl Nolet Jr., executive vice president of Nolet Spirits USA, an Aliso Viejo-based company (the domestic branch of the huge Dutch distiller) that makes the enduringly popular Ketel One vodka. I didn’t use all of the interview in my story, but I thought it was interesting enough to share more of it with you here:

What are the most recent trends in flavored vodka that you have noticed?

There’s obviously been a surge in the past few years of confectionery flavors and fruit flavor combinations (i.e., mango pineapple). We’re seeing now that vodka drinkers, millennials in particular, are gravitating towards more traditional and more natural fruit flavors. Ketel One Citroen and Ketel One Oranje give consumers the chance to enjoy the best of both worlds. We create flavored varietals by infusing only the natural oils and essence of the finest citrus fruit.

Do you have any demographic research or theories about people who like flavored vodkas?

We know that millennial consumers, women in particular, are very open to flavored vodkas and have helped shape the category. Regarding Ketel One’s success in the flavored category, the Ketel One Vodka consumer is a discerning drinker who appreciates quality.

How has the artisanal movement affected the flavored-vodka scene?

The artisanal movement is rooted in the importance of quality and taste. I believe that has led consumers back to the more traditional fruit flavors like citrus versus the more confectionery fruit flavors that have come and gone over the past few years. It has made some vodka drinkers insist on natural ingredients.

I just returned from a 10-day tour through three California wine regions: Lodi, Paso Robles and the Santa Ynez Valley. I was particularly amazed at the pace of gentrification, for better or worse, in once-sleepy Paso Robles. Here’s a brief report on new places and experiences:

Chef Maegen Loring has moved into the large kitchen and restaurant space at picturesque Niner Wine Estates on Highway 46 west of town, and she’s serving refined wine-country cuisine at lunch. (Dinner is coming soon, she told us.) Wine-friendly selections include chilled stone fruit soup made from peaches and nectarines and montaditos topped with humus, feta cheese and slivers of red pepper. Loring’s prawn risotto is like a Vietnamese banh mi, juxtaposing pork belly with grilled shrimp and melding the whole thing together with grilled greens and sesame seeds.

Paso vintners are famous for thinking outside of the box. You’ll find a sublime example of the wisdom of that approach at the newly opened Bodega de Edgar tasting room. I was blown away by the Spanish varietals being produced by young Mexican-American winemaker Edgar Torres. The albarino is fruit-forward, not acidic like its European counterpart, and his flagship Paso de Toro combines tempranillo and syrah to create a kind of super rioja: a gutsy red with a caramelly finish.

Sometimes your tongue gets thick tasting all those red wines. Cleanse your palate with a house margarita at a newish Paso Robles restaurant calledFish Gaucho. It’s fresh and perfectly simple, the way a ‘rita should be: two ounces of Sauza 100% blue agave tequila, organic agave nectar and Peruvian lime juice, served on the rocks. The bar has more tequila-based drinks and craft cocktails. It’s a lively spot for sharing pricey but inventive Mexican fare. Fish tacos ($28 gulp!) are served in very generous portions with your choice of fish, and street tacos ($15) come three to a platter, easily splittable into six. Don’t even try to resist the jalapeno tater tots with chipotle ketchup.

In Tin City, an industrial area that’s home to several winery tasting rooms, you’ll find BarrelHouse Brewing Company, which in addition to crafting fine beers serves as a rollicking party spot for families. Live music, kids, dogs and beer make for a cacophonous but friendly combination in a large space behind the brewery that includes a giant redwood stump, a waterfall, and an ancient flatbed truck that serves as a stage.

I’ll tell you more about Paso in a future post. In the meantime, check out my just-published cover story on the phenomenal phenolics of Paso Robles Bordeaux wines in the August/September edition ofThe SOMM Journal.

I’ve been trying out cocktail recipes that include roses. Why? Because it’s summer, my roses are in bloom, and, well, it seemed like a good excuse to ask some O.C. bartenders to make something rosy and irresistible. (OK, also because I’m working on a magazine article about this topic.) Thought I’d pass them along. I’m making my way down the list. Yes, they pay me to do this.

The Molly Ringwald

Yield: 1 cocktail

2 ounces dry gin

3/4 ounce lemon

2 drops rose water

1/2 ounce brut rosé Champagne

Mixologist’s notes: To make rose water, boil 2 liters of water with the petals from a dozen roses. Rose water can also be purchased at most Middle Eastern food markets and better liquor stores. Fee Brothers and Nielsen-Massey are two excellent brands.

Procedure:

1. Combine first three ingredients in a mixing glass, add ice, and shake. Add brut rosé.

2. With a Hawthorne strainer, strain cocktail into an Old Fashioned glass with ice. Garnish with a grapefruit twist and an edible pansy flower.

Source:Brad Fry, Babette’s Newport Beach

Mrs. Kennedy

Yield: 1 cocktail

1 1/2 ounces dry gin

1/2 ounce simple syrup

1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice

1 dash of rose water

diced peaches

1/4 cup raspberries

3 ounces soda water

Procedure:

1. Muddle first six ingredients in a mixing glass, add ice and shake. Top off with soda water.

2. Shake and strain into a martini glass. Garnish with a Luxardo Maraschino cherry if desired.

Source:Amin Benny, Fig & Olive, Newport Beach

Nolet Vie Rose 75

Yield: 1 cocktail

1 1/2 ounces Nolet’s Silver dry gin

1/2 ounce fresh lime juice

1/2 ounce rose water cardamom simple syrup

2 drops Peychaud’s bitters

1 pinch of muddled dried rose petals

Rosé Champagne

Mixologist’s notes: To make rose water cardamom simple syrup, combine 1/2 cup of super-fine sugar and 1 cup of rosewater in a small saucepan, simmering and stirring until sugar is dissolved. Add ¼ cup cardamom and continue to simmer on low heat for five minutes. Remove pan from heat until completely cool, then refrigerate. Allow mixture to steep for approximately three days, then pour through a fine-mesh strainer to remove solids.

To make candied rose petal sugar rim, rinse and pat dry rose petals. Paint both sides of petals with simple syrup, egg whites or prepared meringue powder and sprinkle with granulated sugar. Dry on parchment or wax paper overnight. After completely dry, crumble into small pieces.

Procedure: Combine first four ingredients in a mixing glass, stir and strain. Top with rosé Champagne in coupe rimmed with candied rose petals.

Our bartender was having way too much fun: Posing for selfies with attractive women, shouting to his friends in an exotic foreign language, slinging Moscow mules with merry vigor. How could he ignore what was happening right above his head on the huge flat-screen TV? The Ducks were slugging it out with the Chicago Blackhawks in game six of the NHL Western Conference finals, and things weren’t going well. For local fans of the game, this was serious-as-a-heart-attack time.

Selanne was manning the bar with former Ducks goalie Guy Hebert, another extrovert who loved chatting with patrons as much as his ex-teammate and hosted his own gaggle of pals. But when it came to bartending, Selanne’s restaurateur skills took over and he left Hebert in his dust. The Finnish Flash expertly mixed rows of mules (the restaurant’s signature drink and one of his favorites) and tasted a couple with a dipped straw covered by a finger at one end, just like the pros do. Hebert was content to pour IPAs from the tap.

Before faceoff, I asked Selanne about the Ducks’ chances. “I hope they get it done tonight,” he said. “I hate game sevens. But Chicago is a hard team to beat on their own ice.” Were they harder than the Detroit Red Wings, the Ducks’ longtime enemies? “Not harder or easier. Just different.”

Selanne glanced at the game occasionally, but the evening was painful for everyone as the Hawks widened their lead. Sometimes it seemed like the better Ducks team was at Selanne’s bar, not in Chicago. Fellow Finn Saku Koivu, who played with Selanne on the Ducks for several seasons, shouted out a greeting in their native tongue. Former Ducks Steve Rucchin and George Parros were rumored to be in the house.

Koivu was just as friendly as Selanne, and about as uninterested in the game. We chatted about his wine collection, which is reported to be impressive.

“I’m selling most of it,” he told me. Why? Because he’s moving back to Finland – like Selanne, he retired from the Ducks at the end of last season – “and they charge a tax of 24 percent on any wine you bring in.”

Mid-game, Selanne’s wife Sirpa breezed in with an entourage of well-dressed women. Champagne was their drink of choice – they were celebrating Sirpa’s birthday, even though the date was far off. She’s in Finland then, so her girlfriends decided to move the big date so they could party on game night.

An oblivious man asked Sirpa where she was from. He seemed fascinated by her Finnish accent. Perhaps sensing danger, she pointed to Selanne behind the bar. “That guy over there in the black shirt is my husband. He’s the owner – but not the real boss.”

The Ducks lost decisively in regulation (the first time that’s happened this postseason) and the place began to empty. But the party atmosphere wasn’t dampened by the outcome. Selanne paused during a round of handshaking near the front door to offer an assessment. “The goalie has to be your best player, always. Otherwise, you won’t win.” His face got serious for an instant. Then he broke into a wide Selanne grin as a friend approached. They chattered in Finnish. The game, and its ignominious result, seemed far away. Time for another round.

When the weather turns warm and the days grow longer, many people break out those crisp Chardonnays or bone-dry Provencal roses. Not my family. For us, nothing says summer like an ice-cold pitcher of sangria. (I’m an optimist: despite the recent spate of cool weather, I know sangria season is coming. Sometime in the next three months, at least.)

At our house, sangria pairs well with my wife’s paella, one of our favorite dishes to cook outdoors in the summer, and it’s light enough to quaff moderately on its own without endangering your sobriety. It’s also very well suited to barbecues; I especially like the way it matches up to grilled chicken and spicy sauces. Best of all, it’s an excellent way to get less expensive reds out of your wine cellar without drawing attention to their imperfections. You don’t need to sacrifice that prized bottle of Kosta Browne Pinot Noir to make great sangria – just a modest red with enough body to still make its presence known when mixed with juice and fruit.

Sangria was born in Spain and Portugal, where gargantuan pitchers are a familiar sight in restaurants. Our favorite sangria recipe, though, comes from closer to home: it was created by Deborah M. Schneider, a friendly and hugely talented Canadian chef who’s a master of Mexican cuisine. (The recipe is from her excellent cook book, “Rancho La Puerta.”) She’s behind Sol Cocina in Newport Beach and a more casual Mexican restaurant, Solita, at Bella Terra in Huntington Beach.

We like this sangria recipe for several reasons. It’s very easy – I’m no Einstein and I have memorized. It’s adaptable – we’ve discovered that it’s successful even when you substitute one juice for another. And if you’re on the war path against sweeteners, it requires no added sugar – in our slight variation of Schneider’s recipe, the fruit juice supplies all the sweetness.

(Schneider recommends adding ½ cup of agave syrup, but we have found the recipe is sweet enough without it.)

Wash the orange and lemon and slice thinly from end to end. Place the slices in a large glass pitcher, add the remaining ingredients, and stir. Chill for at least 2 hours before serving. (We like to let it sit overnight.)

Strain the sangria and serve in tall glasses. Garnish with a piece of soaked fruit from the mixture.

A tip: this sangria travels and ages well. We’ve taken it on trips in the cooler, and we’ve discovered it gets tremendously mellow and integrated a day after mixing. There is a limit, though – once the fruit loses its structure and turns to mush, your sangria is done.

… Here’s more proof that the canned craft beer trend has really taken hold. The Microbrewed Beer of the Month Club, a membership-based beer club that distributes rare U.S. and international craft beers on a monthly basis, announced that canned craft beers will now be included with select monthly shipments throughout 2015.

Several major domestic and international craft breweries are being considered for the company’s September shipment, including Yo-Ho Brewing Company, Evil Twin Brewing, Nebraska Brewing Company, Cigar City Brewing, Wynkoop Brewing Company and Snake River Brewing.

So what’s the deal with canned beer, once scorned as swill suitable only for frat boys and bikers? The company explains:

“The recent surge in craft beer canning can be attributed to many different beneficial factors, including the lower packaging costs when compared to bottling and the increasing availability of mobile canning operations. In addition, cans offer excellent protection against the harmful effects of sunlight, can help keep beer fresh for longer periods of time, are lighter and safer than bottles, and are more environmentally friendly.”

… And here’s another beer trend that makes eminent sense. The Dog Haus, a popular gourmet hot dog spot franchise with a new location in the Westfield MainPlace Santa Ana mall, is testing a new self-serve craft beer system called the iPourit. They’re allowing patrons to pour themselves the following brews: Cismontane Brewing Company’s Citizen Lager, Avery Brewing Company’s Ellie’s Brown Ale, Bootlegger Brewery’s Old World Hefeweizen and the Session IPA from Taps Fish House & Brewery.

… Should the 2015 NHL Western Conference Finals go to Game 6 (and sorry, Black Hawks fans, but I sincerely hope it doesn’t), former Anaheim Ducks teammates Teemu Selanne and Guy Hebert will be slinging some drinks at a special Ducks Watch & Dinner Party at Teemu’s restaurant, Selanne Steak Tavern, on Wednesday. Selanne, the Ducks’ most famous former player, and Hebert, one of its best-ever goalies, will help whip the crowd into a partisan frenzy, no doubt.

You can watch the game in the restaurant’s Wine Room, outside on the veranda and on the four flat screens in the tavern starting at 5 p.m. Dinner reservations are required for all sections of the restaurant, and guests will have their table for the entire night.

I’m guessing Teemu will be whipping up his favorite drink and the restaurant’s trademark libation, the Moscow Mule. Guy will be there because the game is being played in Chi-town, so he is freed from his home-game color commentary TV duties.

… Gordon Biersch Brewing Company announced this week that its Kölsch-style Sommerbrau is available in stores now. Kölsch translates directly to “the beer of Cologne,” in the West of Germany. This light bodied beer is fermented using a special top fermenting yeast strain that Gordon Biersch co-founder Dan Gordon sources from former classmates at the Technical University of Munich, Weihenstephan. Here’s the 411 for beer geeks: